Thread by @LongCovidAdvoc

The psychologisation of a disease occurs when it is believed that psychological states cause or drive or sustain symptoms of that disease.
🚪Front door psychologisation: it's in your head, causes the disease
🚪Back door psychologisation: influences, sustains, drives the disease

Gez & Danny's book looks fantastic and a real resource for those with & without #LongCovid.
Sincerely hoping that this view that: "there is a huge degree that our emotional state can drive symptoms by sending us into a state of sympathetic overdrive"
is not referenced...

Gez is more than welcome to have this as a personal view. Yet it is the reasoning that those who psychologise the disease can take
It is why we have 'integrated' care & research that focus on CBT as stress and anxiety are seen are sustainers of the illness.
There is no evidence

It's also the hypothesis that 'brain trainers' take such as Gupta, Howard, DNRS, Chrysalis etc take. It's the sympathetic nervous system stuck in overdrive that we can influence through top down, psychological intervention.
Again no evidence

It's also present in mainstream medicine especially in conditions that affect women: fibromyalgia, chronic pain, endometriosis, migraine, FND, MUS, IBS & Autism, ADHD. It's why CBT is everywhere.
Again it's not based on decent evidence

The psychologisation of disease is now very slippery and subtle as the goalposts of the definition keep moving to sustain the theory.
There's often sympathy, personal experience and a belief it's physical but....psychology still influences.
We must recognise it

#pwLC & #pwME deserve excellent psychological support to help cope with the trauma of the illness. Yet this must be separate from symptomology and the disease pathways. If they are 'holistic' then patient harm & PTSD are more likely.
This is a key difference.

Twitter has already blown up discussing this and for everyone's sake it would be best resolved. But if a significant book on #LongCovid perpetuates this myth it does a disservice to #pwLC & #pwME.

Would also like to thank Gez for all the meaningful work he does for #LongCovid especially when ill himself. This isn't an angry thread but a way to hopefully dialogue, resolve and progress through dialectic as it's a complex and critical area and needs discussion.

@DianeOLeary @exceedhergrasp1 @Know_HG @keithgeraghty @ShaneyWright @davidtuller1 @Daltmann10 @ahandvanish

If this theory and respective treatments are not in The Long Covid Handbook.
No problem!